Volunteer & Training Focus

If you are able to help or would like further information on any of the opportunities available, let Kevin know directly or email FOBR at friendsofbartleyreservoir@gmail.com

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Committee Secretary:

Hopefully, you've read the 'Group Development' section before reading this! Our secretary Portland Jones has stepped down, and we are looking for a new secretary! It's a perfect position for someone that wants to be more involved, but struggles with the more physical aspects of volunteering. The role would require access to a computer, and competency in working video calls, word documents, and emailing. The role would mainly require attending committee meetings around 4 times a year (mostly online), taking notes and writing up meeting minutes, and keeping an eye on the email inbox and responding to queries. There is some support required when planning for our AGM also. If you're interested, contact is at friendsofbartleyreservoir@gmail.com, or speak to Kevin on 07894844374.

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Orchard Lead:

We are looking for an enthusiastic individual, or set of individuals, with a passion for our orchard project! Once the trees are planted in December, the orchard area will require monthly maintenance, and watering from Spring-Autumn, from 2024. The maintenance task will be shared with St Michael's Primary School, so FOBR will only be required to do maintenance every other month over 8 months - so about 4 x per year. 

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The lead person/ person's will liaise with the orchard lead for St Michael's, and work to encourage members of the Sailing Club, Bartley SUP, and Watersports Centre, to help with watering through the summer months when the school is on holidays. The lead person/person's would use resources from The Orchard Project website to advise the committee on required work and skills to be developed, such as pruning, and liaise with the local charity 'Fruit and Nut Village' for advice and guidance, and lead skills training for other members. 

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If you are interested, please email the committee on friendsofbartleyreservoir@gmail.com, or call Kevin on 07894844374. 

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Birmingham River Champions:

Whilst we don't have rivers around the reservoir, there is an opportunity to take part in some citizen science around Bartley Green. The project is better explained by the organiser below: 

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Dear all,

 

Many thanks to everyone for listening to our new "citizen science" project called Birmingham River Champions (BRC) last week, it was lovely to meet everyone and hear about all of the wonderful work being undertaken. To broadly recap, the BRC is being led by the University of Birmingham alongside the Environment Agency and Birmingham and Black Country wildlife trust. For this, we will train and equip volunteer groups to test and monitor their local river. More information on the project can be found by viewing the presentation slides (minus the videos due to file size) via this link.

 

We value your time and understand you have other commitments so we’ve picked 4 fairly quick techniques: (i) Riverfly; (ii) Water quality monitoring (e.g., phosphate, nitrate, dissolved oxygen testing); (iii) Outfall Safari; (iv) Invasive species (e.g., signal crayfish, Himalayan Balsam) monitoring. Riverfly and Water quality monitoring take 1-2 hours (less than 1 hour with experience). Outfall Safari and Invasive Species Monitoring should take less than 15 minutes. We suggest monitoring every 1-3 months, when weather and river conditions allow you to access shallow and safe stretches of river. In the coming months, we will also be developing an online app / website where your valuable data and information will be shared with other volunteers and the public. At this early stage, we are reaching out to existing volunteer groups and organisations who are already doing amazing work looking after their local parks and rivers, and have experience arranging insurance and risk assessments (although we will provide a Health and Safety Guide to volunteers).

 

If you are interested in learning more about the Birmingham River Champions and taking part, please could you complete this online form, where you can indicate your availability for training days happening later in the month. We would also really like to hear about any ideas you have for how Birmingham River Champions can grow as this is just the start!

 

Many thanks again everyone. Best wishes,

 

Dr James C. White (University of Birmingham)

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If you are interested then please email friendsofbartleyreservoir@gmail.com, or speak with Kevin on 07894844374, and we will out you forward for the next session in Spring 2024. 

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